Nonfeasance
by PinPin13
Summary: A few short, frustrated lessons in life, love, and lock picking. One-Shot. Jr. Short #2


Disclaimer– I do not own the characters, etc. I am only borrowing them from Janet. This is not for profit, just for kicks.

Das' Word Count Challenge – BabeSquad Sept. 2010  
><strong><br>****Nonfeasance****  
><strong>By PinPin

Stephanie was astonished the day Cal started talking to her. It turned out that once he'd warmed up to her, it was hard to keep him quiet. Junior's reserved nature was a stark contrast to his partner's. Cal liked to bitch about anything and everything. Sometimes Stephanie was tempted to break out into a few verses of 'Put on a Happy Face,' except she didn't actually know the words. But if Ranger assigned her to this team for much longer she'd go to the trouble to learn them.

Junior, even more surprised by Cal's sudden eloquence than Stephanie, couldn't figure out what it was about her that flipped Cal's switch. It was hard to get a grunt out of him when she wasn't around, but he was worse than a valley girl with a sugar high when she was on duty with them. The last week and a half had been a trial for them all. They'd become almost too comfortable with each other and all three of them were counting the days until they could be given new assignments.

"Pay attention." Cal was fed up. Junior had become more and more distracted every day. At first it was just annoying, but now that they were helping out with Stephanie's training, his trips to la-la land were becoming a real obstacle.

"I am." Junior retorted.

"Come on, man; this isn't working," Cal gestured at the scuffed up door. "A little input might be helpful. I've tried everything I can think of and none of it has gotten us anywhere."

"Nothing I say is gonna matter."

"The Boss is going to freak if we have to give him a negative report _again_ today."

"Well, what am I suppose to do about it?" Junior asked. "There isn't much we _can_ do anymore. It's up to her now."

Stephanie hrumphed a deep breath and let her hands fall from their work. "You both realize that I'm standing in front of you, right? I can hear everything that you're saying."

Both men looked down at the frustrated hellcat standing between them. She had her lock picking tools in her hands and a seriously irritated glint in her eyes. She'd been trying to break into her apartment for almost an hour. Cal and Junior stood on either side of her, leaning with backs to the wall, arms folded, and ankles crossed. They'd spent days like this, watching Stephanie try to pick locks at various locations. She had yet to successfully break into a single one. Well, she did make it past one lock, if you're willing to count the door that she was frustrated enough to shoot her way through.

"Ignore us and concentrate," was Cal's advice. "There's no way that you can't do this. I could break that lock with a toothpick."

"Well then maybe you should get me a toothpick! Because this shit isn't happening!"

"Here," he said taking the tools from her. "I'll show you again." Cal demonstrated one more time how to insert the tools and rotate them in the specific pattern to tumble the lock. He turned the knob, opened the door, relocked it, and shut it. The lock clicked. "Now you."

She set to it, but was obviously unhappy about it. "How long did it take you to learn how to do this?"

"I knew how to pick a lock before I learned my multiplication tables, so it's not a fair comparison."

Stephanie laughed, and asked sarcastically, "You know the multiplication tables?"

"I know a lot of things and I don't appreciate the attitude. You can give me all the grief you want once we're inside the apartment, but not before."

"Lay off, alright? I'm a beginner."

"No," Cal insisted. "Eleven days ago you were a beginner. Now, you're officially a slow learner."

"I'm trying!"

**"Do or do not, there is no try."**

"Oh no, there is trying alright!" She waved her arms to indicate her general area of the hallway, "there is a whole fuckload of trying going on over here."

"But it isn't doing you much good, is it?"

"Maybe I'll just move," she pouted.

"Focus," Cal ordered. "Bossman will have a fit if we don't get this soon."

"Calm down, he's not going to do anything," she said dismissively.

"He won't do anything to you," he corrected her. "We're a different story."

"Boo hoo," she teased him.

Cal continued to recite the instructions to her as she went through the motions, but to no avail.

"I think it's just not meant to be," she said and shoved the picks into Cal's hands.

He stared at her and held out the tools. "Again."

Reluctantly, she sighed and tried one more time, grumbling, "Ranger can be a real asshole sometimes."

Cal didn't comment. He watched Stephanie as she spent another ten minutes diligently at work on the lock. How she could still not do this was beyond his understanding.

"Can we take a break?" she asked, getting even angrier because the question sounded so whiney. "I can only take so much failure at one time. I need to eat something frosted."

Cal checked his watch. "Give it another twenty minutes. Then we'll break for lunch and find you another lock to try."

They both looked over at Junior, but he hadn't heard a word they'd said. He was busy examining the ceiling with a dopey smile on his face.

"Shit," Cal sighed. "Either you're going to get my ass fired or he's going to get my ass shot." He clapped his hands in front of Junior's face, startling him. "Snap out of it man."

"What?" Junior jumped, startled. "What the hell? What is so damn important? Did she _not_ get it open again in a new and exciting way?"

"Hey!" she protested, offended.

Cal gave his head a shake. "We're on the job and you're gathering wool like a love struck teenager."

Stephanie didn't look up from her efforts as she reminded him, "Yeah, J.R., even I know you have to be aware of your surroundings."

"Moon over your 'sweet Colleen' on your own time."

Junior was aggravated he'd been caught out, so obviously distracted. "Shut the fuck up!"

But Cal just laughed at him. "You're pussy whipped already and you haven't even had a conversation with the woman."

"Awww…" Stephanie gushed. "You've got a girl on your mind? That's sort of sweet."

Cal pulled a face at her. "Tell me you aren't serious."

"Wait." Stephanie did look at Junior this time. "You haven't spoken to her yet?"

"Not exactly."

"In that case, she must be something special to look at." Stephanie rolled her eyes at him and went back to her work.

"I'm gonna call her," Junior asserted, but not very convincingly.

Cal groaned loudly. "Call her, don't call her; how many times do I have to tell you I don't give a shit?"

"One more. Then I'll kick your ass," Junior threatened.

"Just make a decision already, Bro. Shit or get off the pot. She'll either answer or she won't. Nothing you can do about it except make the call. But whatever you do, I don't want to hear about it for another three weeks."

"Three weeks?" Stephanie asked.

"He met her on Valentine's Day."

Speaking slowly with her concentration on the lock, "I'll give you some advice from a woman. If she gave you her phone number on Valentine's Day, it's because she wants you to call her." She cursed under breath and let her hands fall away from their task yet again. Looking Junior in the eye she asked, "And it's been, what did you say, almost three weeks now?" She shook her head at him when he nodded in the affirmative. "If you don't call her in the next 24 hours, you'll be better off just losing that number." Then she bent to make yet another attempt to complete this asinine assignment. "So how exactly do you meet a woman if you've never even spoken to her?"

"I spoke to her," Junior insisted. "She was my waitress. I went out to dinner that night."

Stephanie scoffed with disgust. "You were out on Valentine's Day and picked up the waitress? That is so bastardly."

Cal had heard the whole story of that night's farce from Santos and chuckled as he explained, "he was stood up and _Colleen_ sauntered in and saved his ego."

Now Stephanie was even more appalled. "What kind of heinous bitch stands somebody up on Valentine's Day?"

Junior colored slightly thinking about that night. "It's not important. Really."

"No, no. Come on, please? I want to hear about it. It'll take my mind off my incompetence for a few minutes."

Cal certainly didn't want this thread of conversation to go on any longer. "Geez Louise, could we wait until we're _inside_ the apartment before you two begin the girl-talk portion of the afternoon?"

"That's easy for you to say!" Stephanie's patience was hanging on by her last thread and Cal's attitude was testing its limits.

"No way in hell is that an _easy_ thing for _me_ to say." Cal claimed. "Now seriously, try it again."

She ducked her head and marched down to the end hall. Once there, she spent several private moments giving herself a mental pep talk and doing some very deep breathing exercises, all of which Cal and Junior watched intently. Hey, it was better than looking at each other while they waited. When she finally regained some composure and returned it was with her head high and a determined look on her face. "I'm going to make this lock my bitch." But that isn't exactly how things progressed.

Cal lounged against her doorframe and watched her work. "I just don't understand how you can't do this yet. I'm astounded by it."

"Do you have to stare like that?"

"It's like watching a chimp try to do math." Apparently Cal missed the warning signs; both the straightening of Stephanie's spine and Junior's intake of breath, because he continued, "It's mesmerizing." When she turned to face him, he caught sight of her expression and realized what he'd just said. "Too far?" They both just stared at him. " Yeah, sorry. That was too far."

"I shudder with dread and compassion for the women who have to deal with either of you on a long-term basis."

"That's a bit harsh, don't you think?" Junior asked with a grimace.

"Yeah," Cal agreed. "What kind of thing is that to say to a man who's about to begin wooing a woman? You'll destroy his confidence and doom his efforts before he gets started."

"Right, and I suppose all of that nonsense you've been spouting about how tiresome you find his predicament is just great for a man's mojo?" Stephanie grabbed at Cal's wrist to check the time on his watch. _Ugh_, she still had another five tedious, frustrating minutes until she could get out of that hallway.

"Hey, I know a thing or two about relationships," Cal told them.

"So which is it," she snapped, "do you know one or two things? It can't be more than that."

"I'll have you know my wife and I spent three very happy years – "

"What?" Junior exclaimed, cutting off whatever Cal was about to say.

"Your wife?" Stephanie almost dropped her lock picking tools.

"There's no reason to sound so shocked."

Junior crossed his arms with indignation, "I just thought my partner might have mentioned something like that before now…"

"I used to be married; past tense." Stephanie and Junior exchanged a look and the meaning wasn't lost on Cal. "It was before I had the tat."

Stephanie crossed her arms and mirrored Junior's stance. "And how exactly is your failed marriage supposed to convince us that your relationship advice is any good?"

"Because my advice is that Junior call her right now. This minute. And put an end to this entire discussion."

"In that case, I agree," she conceded, "because I don't know how much more of this I can take on top of my lock debacle."

"You and me both." They looked over at Junior again. He was opening and closing his phone with a fearful look on his face. Cal reached out and snatched the phone away from him and tossed it to Stephanie. Cal held Junior off while she scrolled down his contact list. When she found Colleen, she pressed the 'send' button and tossed it back to him.

Junior paled as he held the phone up to his ear. "Shit, it's ringing."

"I know," Stephanie nodded. "Say 'hello' when she picks up."

Junior had a panicked look on his face and snapped the phone shut.

"What the hell, man?" Cal asked in disbelief.

Staring at the phone in his hands, Junior swallowed audibly. "I'll call her later, when I don't have Burns & Allen as an audience."

"Just so you know," Stephanie stuck a finger in his face, "as angry as I'd be that you didn't call me for three weeks and then hung up on me when you finally did," she softened her voice slightly, "you're cute enough to get away with it and still get a 'yes' out of woman when you ask her out." Then she put all the edge back in her tone. "As long as you do it soon! Like today! Understand?"

Junior gave her a warm smile and Cal threw his hands in the air. "That's it. I've had enough. It's time for some lunch and a change in scenery. We need to relocate before I shoot somebody."

(2,264 words)

**A/N:****This is a one-shot, written in response to a group challenge at Y!BabeSquad. It loosely follows a storyline from an earlier short, 'Nice.' Thank you for reading.**


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